Keeping it Real this Christmas - The Quest for Authenticity

The Christmas season is obviously one of traditions.  Christmas feasts, Boxing Day hangovers and broken toys are looming, and Christmas wouldn’t be the same without the earnest predictions from commentators trying to predict how Christmas will be for thousands desperate retailers struggling to see a wait out of the 2009 recession.  Surveys have been released, retailers are being vox-popped on the evening news, and the second-guessing that is occurring is like a trip to the races.

But it doesn’t take a market research survey to highlight the facts that unemployment is much higher than this time last year, and the proportion of non-earners is higher again when one considers the thousands of school leavers who have opted for tertiary education in the face of a shrinking job market. Consider too the apprehension being felt by those who have retained their jobs but inevitably know others who have been less fortunate. When the question “who’s next?” is on so many minds, Christmas spending is bound to suffer.

So the blindingly obvious fact is that Christmas 2009 will be a bad one for retailers.  There’s less money circulating, and what discretionary income does exist will be spent much more frugally. 

So what are retailers to do?  Much discussion within retail circles tends to focus on the short-term discounting and sales tactics, most of which will eat into margins and further embed consumers’ expectations of never paying full retail price.

While such actions may regretfully be required to maintain cashflow and keep businesses solvent, they shouldn’t be relied upon on their own – because many consumers are choosing to spend less for reasons unrelated to their income.  These reasons will drive consumer spending in different ways, and retailers looking for long-term success have to be cognisant of some significant consumer trends, that broadly fall under the banner of ‘authenticity’.

The authenticity trend will not be news for many readers.  It has been growing for a few years now, starting with the ‘anti-capitalist’ movements popularised by the likes of Naomi Klein’s No Logo book of 2000 and given a major thrust of popularity from a recession and environmental crisis that have forced many to question their values and life quality.   There is a rising mood within the Western world in which people are seeking more simplicity, purity and personal ownership within their lives. 

Examples of how this mood translates into the retail sector are many and varied: traditional home baking recipes are hot again; there has been enormous growth of farmers markets, home gardening, organic foods, and craft hobbyists; cyclists are increasingly eschewing space-age machines for single-gear minimalism;  book clubs, recycling, waste-minimisation, the growth of board-games and the Harry Potter, Twilight, and High School Musical phenomena are all proof-positive of a desire to get back to basics and to recognise what’s truly important. Even the growth of social media (which is ultimate in personalised media) demonstrates how people are increasingly seeking the local, natural and personal.

Not all mass-produced corporate items are inauthentic of course – the iPod and iPhone win through being exceptionally well-designed, personalisable and from an iconic brand (witness how Microsoft’s Zune has more features than an iPod yet fails due to its copycat unauthenticity); the Singstar Playstation games succeed through their highly social nature, and Wii consoles do well within the authenticity trend because of their physical effort they require (physical work long being regarded as more ‘honest’ than, say, desk-work).

Talk to consumers about their attitudes and plans for Christmas and the authenticity trend is especially evident. Spending time with family is of course the mainstay of Christmas in most countries but it appears to have become even more prominent, as people reflect on a tough year in which they’ve repeatedly had to question what long-term satisfaction is gained from material goods.  October 2009’s  Synovate InFact survey of 11,400 people across 16 markets revealed that 25% felt that the recession helped them recognise their true priorities, and 58% agreed that they “will do their best to not go back to spending what they used to”. 

In summary, many consumers are feeling punch-drunk from the last year and the concept of hitting the shops for the pre-Christmas build-up is being questioned. Certainly the Christmas shopping crush has often been disliked, but not questioned to the same extent as this year.  Regardless of source, research abounds that shows that many consumers plan to delay their shopping until the sales begin, many also aim to buy cheaper items, and fewer gifts will be exchanged overall. 

And so the challenge has been laid down for retailers to sell authenticity, which commands a premium, over more of the ‘same-old’, which has already progressed too far down the discounting spiral of death.  Admittedly it is too late now for most retailers to change their Christmas stock but perhaps it is not too late to alter how it is marketed, or at the very least to reconsider the options for the next season’s stock selection.

Jonathan Dodd